Networks have been used in conjunction with electronic devices for some time to facilitate the exchange of data and share resources among a plurality of the electronic devices communicatively coupled to a common exchange medium. In many systems, the use of a network may enable the efficient transfer of data between the electronic devices. Additionally, a network may make possible the sharing of peripheral devices among more than one of the electronic devices in the network.
Networks may be used to allow one or more host computing devices access to a plurality of shared, physically disaggregated peripheral devices. Particularly, in some systems the host computing devices and the shared peripheral devices may all be communicatively coupled to an intermediary bridge device, which allocates certain of the shared peripheral devices to one or more of the computing devices. Once the allocation process is complete, a data connection between selected shared peripheral devices and a corresponding computing device may be created by the bridge device.
In some cases, the bridge device may create a connection such that the selected peripheral devices interact with the host computing devices as if the shared peripheral devices resided physically on the host computing device. In such cases, a peripheral device may only be visible to a host computing device if the connection to the host computing device has been established prior to the host computing device executing a hardware enumeration process.
Throughout the drawings, identical reference numbers designate similar, but not necessarily identical, elements.